Beeps and Hums
by Unanon
Summary: Ultimate X-Men: So, how DO Ororo and Henry become a couple? Pairing: Storm/Beast


Beeps and Hums  
  
By Unanon  
  
Rating: PG-13. mild language primarily.  
  
Archive: Anyone who wants it, just ask.  
  
Summary: Ultimate-Comicverse; some mention of events occurring between issues 3 and 5.  
  
Acknowledgements: Mamfa, titian-tressed goddess from Oz, for the Beta  
  
Disclaimer: All X-Characters belong to Marvel; I just play with them occasionally as part of my general idolatry.  
  
Pairing: Ororo/Henry  
  
Explaining myself: Ororo has been whispering some wretched Henry-cuteness into my ear for days now. She's in love, and she's being a bloody smug bitch about it! She isn't very forthcoming about details either, 'stupid- looking American cow!'  
  
*ducks a flying trusty pair of size-eights and runs!*  
  
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
  
Those early days at the mansion, I didn't know what to make of Henry. I first saw him while being introduced around by Jean; a really huge guy hunkered on the common room floor, surrounded by what looked like a completely disemboweled Sony Playstation2. "Techno-geek," I thought with a smirk; this was the guy who would stay behind with the getaway vehicle and monitor shit for the rest of us via computer while scarfing down Hostess cupcakes and Jolt cola. Two seconds later he had done a triple flip across the room, landed at my feet with the silent grace of a jungle cat, and given me the most enormous, toothy grin I'd ever received in my life. It doesn't matter what he said, or what I replied. All I know is that meeting Henry McCoy was like getting a kick in the gut. He had the bluest eyes I'd ever seen, so deep and warm that they were almost unreal. A few days, conversations, and awkward silences later, it was with more than a little shock that I realized I was attracted to him. Clearly, first impressions are not always to be trusted.  
  
Naturally, I proceeded to avoid him as much as possible, choosing to spend the bulk of my free time with Peter and Bobby. It was a cowardly thing to do, but what choice did I have? The entire situation with Xavier was strange and new, and there were no promises as to how long the gravy train would last. It wouldn't be a good idea to make any real ties with anyone until I could be sure of. well. anything!  
  
Avoiding Henry outside of training became increasingly difficult, especially after it became clear he liked me. Jean would let things slip in that offhand deliberate way of hers. In the showers after a training session it would be: "Henry's really quite jealous of Peter. calls him a 'tractor-loving commie!!'.. Pass the shampoo, please.. Anyway, you'd think a veritable genius like Beast would have a moderately developed gaydar! I mean, c'mon! The boy's so obviously flaming. Are you done with the strawberry conditioner?" If we had kitchen duty together it was always, "Oh, don't forget to throw some tomatoes in the salad. Henry loves tomatoes.." or some such drivel. Frankly, I was getting tired of it.  
  
It took Henry's near death to make me come to my senses. Those moments after the bomb went off still wake me up at night, sweaty and nervous. All I have are a series of muted impressions: Peter barricading us as I kneel over Henry's body, Bobby screaming over the com that Cyclops had been shot, Henry's skin getting clammy beneath my fingertips, a gush of frustration at the failure of my powers to produce anything substantial. Sleet, for God's sake! After that, all I can remember is anger, tsunami-sized waves of anger and resentment toward Xavier, the idiot Croats shooting at us, and at Magneto and his damn Brotherhood for kidnapping the spoiled whitebread chippie in the first place. Apparently, I was quite vocal about it with Cyclops; to be honest, I don't have any freakin' idea what I said.  
  
Watching the gruesome details of Henry's surgery, my mind came up for air long enough to register Cyclops' story about Henry's mom. I think that was when I decided that I didn't want to pretend anymore. After the surgery, I was left to my own devices. Wolverine and Jean were off playing footsie somewhere, Peter was busy trying to talk to Bobby through 2 inches of oak, Cyclops was brooding in some dark corner, and I imagine that Xavier was busy petting his pussy. I decided to sit with Henry.  
  
Just walking into the recovery room was an eerie experience for me. I'd never spent any time around hospitals, clinics, or anyone seriously ill for that matter. Everything was new and strange to me. The room was silent, save for the hum and occasional quiet beeping of expensive-looking equipment I assumed was monitoring Henry's vital signs. There was a slightly repulsive antiseptic smell lingering in the air. My exhausted imagination attributed it to a combination of alcohol and blood; it nauseated me.  
  
Henry's face was so pale. I had a fleeting sensation of panic and then anger that Jean having left him alone. If anything happened with Henry while she was off with that shady Wolverine character she would never be able to reach him in time. I reached for his hand, but pulled back at the discovery of what looked like a very painful, huge-ass needle sticking into the back of it. "An I.V," I thought, touching it gingerly. My eyes wandered to a clamp-type device attached to his fingertip, "and that's a blood-oxygen doo-hickey!" I was suddenly very thankful for those few episodes of ER I'd watched. I slid my hand beneath his.  
  
"Henry?." My voice was surprisingly loud to my own ears, so I lowered it to a whisper. "Henry, can you hear me?" I knew how dumb those words were, how cliché, even before they came out of my mouth, but I said them anyway.  
  
What's even worse is that I waited for a response.  
  
Beeps and low electric hums were the only sounds that broke the silence, washing over me with increasing intensity while I focused on the even rise and fall of Henry's chest. Quite suddenly I got the irrational urge to run around the room shorting out equipment just to stop the noise, just to be able to hear the sound of Henry's breathing. Just to confirm with my ears, as well as my eyes, that he was still alive. I wanted to lay my head on his chest and hear the pounding of his heart, I wanted his hand to squeeze mine, I wanted his eyes to open. I bloody well wanted him to leap out of the bed, tear out all the needles and tubes, do a fuckin' handspring and tell me it was all a really tasteless joke!!!  
  
I just wanted.  
  
Instead, I leaned over him carefully until I felt his breath against my cheek, warm and steady. It was pathetically reassuring. My hand crept to the edge of the blanket, slowly pulling it down to his waist. Long lines of neat sutures ran across his torso, little railroad tracks leading to nowhere. My gut wrenched when I noticed that Jean had used thick metal staples in some parts. Metal. Staples. I had watched her stitch him up, hands primly behind her back as if she were too pristine to touch him. I remember feeling that she was far too calm, too composed to possibly be taking her actions seriously; it was as if she were showing off one of her neat little telekinetic tricks for Xavier's benefit instead of holding a man's life in her.er.mind. I let my fingers lightly trace the puckered end of one perfect line of tracks. Staples, for fuck's sake. Ignoring a trickle of lightheadedness, I covered him back up, pulled my chair closer to the side of the bed, placed one of my hands beneath his once more and waited.  
  
The late afternoon sun filtered in the tall windows, golden and warm, revealing shimmering dust particles dancing around the equipment. It was making me sleepy and pissing me off at the same time. It just seemed unnatural that fluffy clouds could float innocently; the gardens outside the windows should not be so disgustingly colorful while Henry wasn't even conscious. I was severely tempted to change that; it would be a simple thing to paint the skies the color of my mood. But I held back. I simply was too emotionally and physically drained to make the effort. With a sigh, I leaned forward and rested my head on the bed and slept.  
  
I woke up maybe an hour later to fingers lacing slowly through my hair. I sat up smiling.  
  
"You're awake."  
  
"Barely." His voice was slightly ragged and weak; his eyes were still closed. "Ororo?"  
  
"Henry?" I took his hand and leaned closer.  
  
"Did we." He attempted to moisten his lips, "Did everyone get out ok?"  
  
I squeezed his hand gently. "You were the only one hurt, Henry." I stood and poured him some water from a pitcher at his bedside. "Magneto actually ended up helping us against the Croats."  
  
His eyes blinked open at that. "Magneto?"  
  
"Yes." I positioned a straw between his lips. "Drink some of this."  
  
He sipped weakly, barely moistening his mouth, then settled back into the cushions, closing his eyes. "Thanks."  
  
"You're welcome." I sat back down in frustration. I wanted to reach forward, take his hand, stroke his hair, anything so long as I was touching him, confirming he was actually warm and awake and alive, but I was too chicken.  
  
After a long pause, he spoke without opening his eyes, his voice thick, "How bad?"  
  
Gathering my gumption I leaned forward and dared to lightly caress his cheek. "It's pretty bad, Henry." His eyes snapped open questioningly, but I continued, "Jean mentioned something about unusual transplant procedures." I paused. "I was so worried."  
  
"Ororo." He moved as if to sit up, grunting in surprised pain. I was livid.  
  
"You twit! You don't need to be moving yet!" I placed my hands firmly on his shoulders and pressed him back down. "You'll rip the stitches or something!" I had an all-too-vivid fleeting image of those impressive metal staples tearing out of Henry's flesh, spilling gallons of blood and unrecognizable guts onto the floor; irrationally, I started to feel a bit lightheaded. I had to sit down and put my head in my hands, but I managed a weak, "Don't do that again, deal?"  
  
".O.K." I could hear the humor in his voice so I looked up. He was smiling the smallest smile. "You don't look too good."  
  
I snorted, "Look who's talking!"  
  
"At least I have a reasonable excuse." He shifted uneasily, brow tightened against the pain, "Did you get the number of the house that fell on me?"  
  
"We think it was a bomb of some sort, or a grenade."  
  
"Oh."  
  
"Yeah." I moved toward him again, playfully tickling his ear with a lock of his hair; I couldn't avoid touching him at this point. "For a while there we thought you were dead."  
  
"I'm glad I'm not," he quipped. The cheeky bastard was clearly starting to feel better. I had to smile.  
  
"So am I."  
  
Ignoring all the tiny rational voices in my head screaming 'no, wait, no!' I leaned in, took his head in my hands and kissed him softly, full on the mouth. At first, shock kept Henry unresponsive, but not for long. I hadn't planned on it being more than a prolonged peck, but when his lips began to move beneath mine, and his thick, extraordinarily gentle fingers began to wind into my hair, caressing my scalp, I lost all sense of restraint and succumbed to the swirling of my astonished senses. This wasn't the wild, frantic tangling of tongues to which I was accustomed. Instead, it was a conversation, miraculously complete and surprising with its depth and intensity. I'd never had lips touch mine that were as plaintively hungry and honest. His breathing, his tongue, his hands, all carried a certain terrified desperation; he was forceful, but not intrusive. It was a revelation.  
  
We pulled apart, breathing heavily, fingers still laced in each other's hair. For a moment it seemed as if all we could do was stare at each other, strangely tense. Then I smiled.  
  
"My, my, Mr. McCoy!" I teased. "Had I known you could kiss like that I wouldn't have spent so much of my time with the gay 'tractor-loving commie.'"  
  
Henry relaxed visibly, "Jean told you." He sounded like a kid whose secret stash of Oreo cookies had been taken away.  
  
"Of course."  
  
"Damn telepaths," he grumbled. Then he looked up, shocked. "Wait. Did you say gay!?!"  
  
I almost fell off the narrow edge of the hospital bed with laughter. "Henry, hon. you may be really smart, but sometimes you're completely clueless."  
  
"Gay." He said thoughtfully. "It makes sense now. How on earth could I have missed it!"  
  
I smirked. "You were too busy being jealous."  
  
He nearly blushed. "True."  
  
"You know, I've liked you since the day I got here."  
  
He paled at that. I was suddenly very scared that it had all been a mistake, that Jean was wrong about his attraction, that I'd blurted out a dangerously honest thing that I was unable to take back. "Henry?"  
  
"Why did you avoid me?" His voice was cold, but hurt as well. I immediately felt like the worst kind of bitch, and I debated to just throw him a wise-ass reply and make a hasty exit with the excuse of getting Jean. Chalk the whole incident up as a post-operative cosmic fluke.  
  
But I couldn't do that. I couldn't return to the agony of lying to myself about Henry on a daily basis. I couldn't do that for me.  
  
"I was afraid."  
  
He snorted, "You're not afraid of anything."  
  
I felt as if I'd been accidentally iced over by Bobby. "How would you know, Henry!?" My anger pulsed mild static electricity; each tiny hair on my arms stood on end. "We've never spoken outside of practice, at least not without anyone else around. We don't know each other's pasts, each other's secrets. Shit! I don't even know your favorite color!" My lips clamped shut and I turned away. I couldn't look him in the eye, I was so furious. At that moment I was hating him, but also hating myself for a myriad of things: my insensible moments of honesty, the fact that I was barely holding back frustrated tears, my plain old stupidity for following my heart for once instead of my imminently more sensible inner voices.  
  
"Blue."  
  
I sniffled, composing myself, "What?"  
  
"My favorite color is blue."  
  
I accepted his calm statement for the apology it was. In truth, my heart had no choice but to do so. "Mine too." I turned towards him but my smile was lost in a gasp.  
  
"Henry!" One hand flew to my mouth and the other actually pointed! "Henry, your hair!"  
  
"You were the one who tangled it up, you passionate witch!"  
  
"No, no! It's changed!"  
  
"Huh?!"  
  
"Wait right there!" Ignoring the utter stupidity of my comment, I hopped off the bed and sprinted down the hall to Jean's room, grabbed a mirror from her dresser and scrambled back to Henry's side as fast as my feet could take me. Catching my breath, I mutely handed it to him.  
  
For a moment he was silent, emotions flickering across his face with astonishing speed, then he spoke, "I guess it's a good thing I'm partial to blue."  
  
My lips twisted into a grin. "Hon. it's a good thing I'm fond of blue!" I held out the com I'd found on the bedside table. "Don't you think this is weird enough to get a second opinion from our resident experts?"  
  
He reached for the com, his fingers brushing mine. Instead of taking the device, he caught my wrist and pulled me in slowly for a kiss. All apology, acceptance, anticipation and hope were contained in a single brushing of mouths. I pulled away.  
  
"You're still injured. I don't want to tire you out. "  
  
He smiled at me, then began to speak urgently into the com, completely missing my whispered amendment: "Yet."  
  
~fin~ 


End file.
